Archives for May 2010

I’ve been interested in family history and genealogy for about ten years. With some gaps in between, I’ve been reviewing and identifying old family photos and entering family history data into a genealogy program on my PC and on a genealogy wiki called We Relate. This being Memorial Day Weekend, it is an opportune time to write briefly about researching family history. [Read more…]

I have taken the first step toward ending our long time relationship with Bank of America. There are numerous reasons for this, the latest being an account maintenance fee being imposed on one of our smaller accounts. There was no advance warning of this. It surprises me that a bank that has used so much of our money, including mortgage and investment accounts, would do this. [Read more…]

We drove to Long Branch Lakes yesterday to check on the construction progress of the condo we are buying. Things are moving along rapidly. The unit is completely shelled in and framed, with rough plumbing and electrical completed. The garage is finished and our horse’s shoe was embedded in the garage floor surface as we asked. [Read more…]

I have been reading and writing a lot about gold investing in recent weeks. The spot price of gold has hit highs in 2010. A well known gold ETF – GLD – peaked on My 12 but has since fallen off some. Even still, it has returned 8% year to date. The gold bugs are convinced it will go much higher as the world prepares for disaster, including elimination of the dollar as the de facto reserve currency. Other experts aren’t so sure. [Read more…]

Last year I became active in both Twitter and Facebook. There were many reports that baby boomers had become a fast-growing segment in social media. I joined up for both personal and business (blogging) reasons. [Read more…]

The adage “better late than never” applies to retirement saving. It’s unfortunate that so many baby boomers neglected saving for retirement. Some are in this category because conspicuous consumption trumped saving. Others relied heavily on the real estate or stock market bubbles and lost. Still others failed to diversify, such as by putting every spare dollar into their own business venture that ultimately went nowhere. What happens now? [Read more…]

As they empty the nest and approach retirement, many baby boomers are thinking about what to do with their present home. Should they remodel to sell and downsize? Should they finally implement those upgrades for a carefree retirement lifestyle? What about new living spaces – what should be done with those? [Read more…]

Gold prices are again nearing a record high. Should a baby boomer buy gold now? If you own gold, should you sell? Are there easy or obvious answers to these investing questions? I think not. [Read more…]

If you are considering a lump investing strategy when you retire, a life income annuity is surely on your list of options. I’ll bet every baby boomer without a pension and with money saved is considering annuities. There is so much to know and read about the costs, risks and benefits of annuities. Insurance companies are scrambling to introduce new annuity products with new and different features. Salesmen are being trained to explain them to confused retirees. Whom do you trust to know whether you should buy an annuity with a lump sum investment?

What is financial success? The American consumer’s definition of financial success seems to be changing by year and varying by age. That’s what broker TD Ameritrade learned from a recent survey. [Read more…]